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In politics, little is more irresistible than the alluring scent of power.

After 50 years on the opposition sidelines, the federal NDP belatedly picked up that scent in the last election. On the weekend that scent led its members into the arms of Thomas Mulcair.

Time will tell whether the party succumbed to a case of fatal attraction as some of its elder statesmen feared or more simply decided to grow up and become a full-fledged national party with credible aspirations to power.

What is certain is that for all the misgivings of former leader Ed Broadbent and former Saskatchewan premier Roy Romanow, the New Democrats ultimately played it safe by selecting Mulcair.

He is the leader most likely to keep Quebec in the NDP fold. In that province, none of his opponents even register.

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Any other choice could have set the NDP back to pre-Jack Layton levels in Quebec and the party back to third or fourth place behind the Liberals and the Bloc Québécois.

Mulcair was also the most ready to take on Stephen Harper in the House of Commons and the only one to combine electoral success with previous government experience.

It is hard to overstate Harper’s contribution to the NDP result. In the face of a less polarizing Prime Minister, the outcome of the leadership campaign might have been different.

It was easier for the New Democrats to be content to treat electoral defeats as moral victories when the governments they sat across from were made up of more like-minded Liberals or led by red Tories.

Harper’s take-no-prisoner style also helped turn Mulcair’s abrasive edge into an asset rather than the liability it would have been in a more gentle era.

Still, without that edge, Mulcair would probably have prevailed before the fourth ballot: he was a natural choice for the NDP for deeper reasons than opportunistic electoral interest.

For the past few weeks, part of the NDP establishment had contended that Mulcair posed a possible risk to the party’s soul. But that argument rang hollow in the face of the fact that without Quebec, the soul of the NDP was never actually whole.

That factor kept the party on the margins of the defining unity issues of the recent past. It prevented the NDP from acting as a much-needed bridge between Quebec’s progressive forces and those in the rest of Canada.

Enough New Democrats came to those conclusions to facilitate Mulcair’s victory. In the same spirit, more than 90% of them declined to consider the language-challenged Paul Dewar in spite of his otherwise impeccable New Democrat credentials.

Given that the vast majority of them were not from Quebec, this may be the last time a candidate who is not fully bilingual makes a bid for national leadership for a long time.

As leader, Mulcair inherits a party that may be less resistant to change than its elite assumed. Nathan Cullen’s solid showing — on the strength of the controversial concept of an electoral alliance with the Liberals — can only be interpreted as a token of that openness.

On the way to victory Saturday, Mulcair also rallied major caucus players — MPs like Ontario’s Charlie Angus and Alberta’s Linda Duncan — whom he will need to heal the internal wounds of the leadership campaign.

That being said, Mulcair should under no delusion as to the terms of the mandate he received on Saturday.

In the past, the NDP has always been uncommonly patient with its leaders. Jack Layton’s last campaign was also his fourth one — a longevity that neither the Conservatives nor the Liberals have ever extended to a losing leader.

Chances are Mulcair will not be afforded the same luxury as Layton. The tide that brought him to the leadership in the face of a strong undercurrent of establishment opposition will quickly recede if he does not deliver convincing electoral results.

In contrast with his predecessors, Mulcair will be judged first and foremost on his ability to bring the party to power. Should the NDP falter on the road to the 2015 election, he is more likely to endure the hell of a leadership challenge than to have political sainthood bestowed upon him.

Chantal Hébert is a national affairs writer. Her column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.

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